Recently my wife and I took a road trip through California and a bit of Nevada. Mostly California, spending ten days on the road seeing some of the sights we’d collected on a wish list over the years. Since we’re wintering in southern Arizona again this year, California is close, even though the distances out here in the West can be daunting.

It took most of a day to cover the distance between Tucson and the first night’s stop near San Bernardino. With some exceptions near the state border on I10, traffic was heavy, becoming increasingly congested as we neared LA. Having now traveled across America by car several times, I like to think I’ve got a pretty good handle on regional driving characteristics. California drivers are not the worst, but they are close to the top of the list, driving excessively fast and aggressively.

I’d spent some time in California over the years, always in the course of work, and always bound to the cities. This trip was going to cover places not in the big cities, including three days skipping around parts of the Pacific Coast Highway. It turned out to be the best experience we had in that state.

Being late January, it was the height of the off-season at the California coast. It was also sunny and about 60°. Perhaps chilly for the locals, but springtime weather for us! 

Our first day on the PCH (AKA California State Route 1) began at Morro Bay. We stayed the night before in Paso Robles, and in the morning drove over the hills and through the canyons on CA41 until we reached the picturesque little town featuring a big rock in its harbor.

Street parking was readily available right on the waterfront roadway, so that’s where we parked. After walking around a bit, and checking out a couple shops- not everything was open- we decided to grab lunch at a waterfront restaurant named Dutchman’s.

Wife had a sandwich while I went with a cup of clam chowder and a shrimp cocktail. Shrimp was good. Chowder tasted like Snow’s out of a can. But the view was great, and we saw an otter doing the backstroke in the harbor while we enjoyed our food.

After lunch we headed north on the PCH. The road hugged the coast for the first few miles, and we enjoyed riding in the sun, watching the Pacific rolling up onto the beaches.We stopped at a few of the pull outs to check out the beaches, and continued northbound.

We slow-rolled through the little town of Cambria. Wife wanted to see if we could find a strange little house called Nit Wit Ridge that had some notoriety. We found it, but it was no longer accessible to the public, so we continued up the road, in search of more of the fabled coastal highway.

We didn’t have to wait very long. Almost immediately the road returned to running along the coast, and the views were spectacular. We stopped at several turnouts to admire the sand, waves and water. We watched a hawk floating in the oncoming breeze, and we met a beach squirrel.

The views only got better as we travelled up and through San Simeon. After going through the small town consisting primarily of a conference center, and past the entrance to Hearst Castle, the road continued tight to the shore. We made our final northbound stop near the Piedras Blancas lighthouse, the entry to which was gated.

Here we ran into some reality that regularly affects the Pacific Coast Highway. A few miles ahead the road was closed due to a landslide that occurred two years ago. Apparently the land was still too unstable to repair the road, so continuing up CA1 to Monterrey was out of the question. This wouldn’t be the last landslide area we encountered, but it was the only one that had the road closed.

So we reversed course, and headed southbound to stop at what turned out to be the most interesting, amazing and entertaining stops of the day- the Elephant Seal Vista Point. Here we saw what had to be the world’s largest convention of very large sea creatures flopping, lounging and doing other things I’ll not mention (and did not record) on the beach. The magnitude of the gathering was impressive- watch the video below. 

We spent quite a while watching the seals. But the sun was waning, and with the breeze coming off the water it was cooling off quickly. We still had the long detour to drive back over the hills and up CA 101 to Monterrey, where we were to stay the night. 

But we did have one more surprise in store before leaving San Simeon. As we were driving southbound, I noticed a few cars pulled over on the roadside across from the ocean. Folks were watching something out on the fenced in range. So I pulled in and we got out to look as well.

Yep. Zebras. Neither Wife nor I had any idea zebras existed in the wild anywhere in the USA. But here they do. The little herd are the remnants of animals owned by the Hearst family. They’ve been living wild on the range for decades. 

The drive up to Monterrey was a long and frenetic experience. We didn’t get to the hotel until well after dark.

COMING SOON: More PCH & Big Sur

Here’s a bonus video of the beach and ocean just north of Cambria, CA.